This is the incredible story of an Australian man who recovered from high-velocity gunshot wounds in a politically motivated assassination attempt. Despite his doctors’ certitude that he’d never walk again, he achieved the impossible—without surgery. How did he recover?

Sydney resident David Liang had flown to Johannesburg on June 28, 2004, with several other Australians. Their purpose—to sue Chinese Vice President Zeng Qinghong on his state visit to South Africa.

David, a Falun Gong practitioner, intended to bring the high-ranking Chinese politician to justice for his involvement in the persecution of Falun Gong in China, and already had in hand a lawsuit, accusing the Vice President of genocide, torture, and crimes against humanity.

“In China, he is above the law, we can’t do anything,” says David. “But we can do something during his visits to other countries. We can sue him.”

Little did David and his companions expect that they weren’t going to achieve their objective that evening.

It soon became apparent to the group as they drove along the highway to the capital city of Pretoria that they were being tailed by a hired hitman, who soon lined his vehicle up with their rented car and unleashed a barrage of bullets from an AK-47 assault rifle.

Initially mistaking the sound for fireworks, they soon realized they were under fire, and David had been hit. David lost function of his feet. The group’s car veered off the highway at a high speed.

Fortunately, the long grass beside the highway slowed their car to a complete stop.

The hitman stopped too. He looked back. David and his group wondered if he was going to shoot them dead. Would they die that night?

The gunman eventually took off. He wasn’t interested in robbing them. The attack was to stop them from reaching the Presidential Guest House, where the Chinese Vice President was.

“Immediately I thought in my mind that it is not criminal and it is political…” says Dan, who features in the documentary “Aftermath of the Gunshot.”

The aftermath

Things looked grim for David at this point. His feet had gaping wounds. “I had a golf-ball-size hole in my right ankle,” said David, who was in immense pain. “I did not take the hospital’s suggestion of having an amputation.”

Doctor Nabeel Moosa, a surgeon at Chris Hani Baragwanath Hospital, said: “I think this is one of the most difficult open fractures to treat. His wounds are very contaminated. His ankle joint, his subtalar joint, which is the joint below the ankle … it’s gone.”

A taxi driver by profession, David’s gunshot injuries left him unable to drive. With two young children and elderly parents to look after, finances became an issue. David was the main breadwinner.

The dreaded question of whether or not David could ever walk again took a toll on his elderly mother, who was already not in good health. Upon learning that David was attacked, she was unable to sleep, and began skipping meals.

A grim prognosis

David visited Dr. Lunz, a respected ankle and foot surgeon in Sydney, and was told he may never be able to freely move his feet again, let alone return to taxi driving for a living.

“This right ankle joint is totally destroyed and it is most likely he will never again be able to walk at all,” explains Dr. Lunz in his prognosis. “Even with surgery he is unlikely to be able to walk functionally.”

David was urged to undergo a high-risk surgery, which was likely to further reduce his chances of walking. Without surgery, the risk of infection from his wounds could lead to his losing both feet altogether, and endanger the rest of his body.

David’s family opted for the surgery.

Miraculous recovery

When David’s friend Peggy heard of the surgery’s repercussions, she made a suggestion to save David’s feet that didn’t involve surgery.

Peggy, a former doctor of Chinese medicine and acupuncture, is also a Falun Gong practitioner.

“David is a Falun Gong practitioner, and he’s practiced for a while,” said Penny. “So I shared my thoughts with his family. Eventually they all agreed with me. Therefore, David was discharged from the hospital. We told his doctor that we would try the practice of Falun Gong. If this did not work we would come back.”

In the subsequent period of time, David practiced Falun Gong’s seated meditation. Doing so calmed his mind. Since he could not sit with his legs in the lotus position due to the wounds, he would sit with his legs loosely crossed.

At first, he required a wheelchair to get around. As he continued to practice Falun Gong, he recovered bit by bit. He was eventually able to sit in the full lotus position. He also progressed onto crutches.

“Chinese people all know that qigong, especially Falun Gong, has high-energy matter that can help disinfect wounds and decrease inflammation,” explains Peggy.

“Everyday I would just wash his wounds with saline, tincture of iodine and ethanol. However, I know that tincture of iodine and ethanol are not enough to stop the infection in such serious gunshot wounds. It won’t work at all.”

David insisted to practice Falun Gong through thick and thin, and it paid off tremendously.

“Honestly it was not my nursing that resulted in his healing,” says Peggy. “Tissue had grown back inside the wound, and the holes had become filled.”

David had recovered.

Three months after the shooting

David returned to South Africa to show the doctors how he had recovered from practicing Falun Gong. Though it was originally estimated it’d take 2–3 years to determine if David could ever walk again, here he was walking three months later, and without having undergone any surgery.

The hospital’s psychological sociologist, Mr. Robinson, said, “The interesting thing about David here is that there is no explanation from the physical point of view of how his feet recovered so quickly.”

David’s thoughts post recovery

“Some people ask me if I hate the shooters for doing this to me,” says David in a conference in South Africa.

Throughout his entire recovery, David has insisted on keeping up his practice of Falun Gong and adhering to the spiritual practice’s three tenets of “Truthfulness-Compassion-Tolerance.”

David has managed to turn the distressing shooting incident into an opportunity to expose the Chinese regime’s genocidal campaign against Falun Gong. In doing so, he has also generated much interest in the peaceful meditation practice itself, which David owes his recovery to.

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